Rare Book Monthly Articles - March - 2023 Issue

The World's Oldest Near Complete Bible to Be Sold at Auction

There are books and there are books. Some are larger, some in color, some are rarer. When a book is considered the fundamental source for a field or a category they call it their bible. They use that term as the highest accolade.    They use that term because, based on Guinness and common sense, the Bible is the most widely published book in world history. Five billion copies have been printed. It is based on the books of the Torah. Today the most valuable book is thought to be a Gutenberg Bible and now there is fresh reconsideration as to whether an earlier manuscript volume, known as th...

A Collector Left a 70,000 Book Collection with No Instructions on How to Proceed

It is not the largest book collection ever amassed by a private owner. It does not equal the 100,000 book and manuscript collection of 19th century obsessive Thomas Phillipps. Nor, obviously, does ...

Bill Wolfe Carries on the Tradition of Louis Collins Books in Seattle

Louis Collins owned one of Seattle’s best known and longest running antiquarian bookshops. He was also highly regarded as the presenter of the Seattle Antiquarian Book Fair, one of the larger regio...

The ABAA Pasadena Book Fair: the field is recovering

It's been three years since the California International Antiquarian Book Fair returned last month to Pasadena to some trepidation considering how long it has been. The result was a very good event...

The Great Deaccession Has Begun

In an article in the Washington Post last December 19, Karen Heller announced, “the Great Deaccession commenced.” It is a fact that people with shelves full of books they will never read, or never ...

Auction History - Recreating Important Sales

When you consider buying or bidding on examples of printed history often your first sense is to get into its commercial history. Why?  Because printing creates identical examples and over time some...

Roberto Clemente Has Been “Cancelled” in Florida School

The wave of book censorship sweeping through America these days reached a point of absurdity recently as schools in Duval County, Florida (Jacksonville area) followed a state mandate to “err on the...

Leslie, Sloane and The French Booksellers... The Dots on the “i” of Jamaica.

My passion for old books about Jamaica goes back to the time I wrote the book History of Jamaica from 1494 To 1838 (DREAD Editions). That’s when I realized that most French booksellers think that H...

Contemporary Issues in Rare/Antiquarian Bookseller Management

In anticipation of Scholium Group’s annual report at the end of March and as a continuation of his research into the structural changes underway in the Collecting Ecosystem explored in Contemporary...

$55,000 in Rare Books Stolen and Recovered in One Day

Rare Book theft stories rarely end quickly but this one was in and out in one day. Some smart police work and a not too smart thief brought it to a quick conclusion. The books, which the bookstore ...

To understand Collectible Paper Auctions Click here

One of the interesting ways to follow the auctions is to select Upcoming Auctions and voila and the first option on the down bar:  Auction Home,  There are the most recently posted auction results ...

An Ancient Papyrus Scroll, Recently Discovered, Has Been Translated

A 2,000+-year-old manuscript has recently been deciphered and translated. It was found in a necropolis or burial site for the ancient Egyptian city of Memphis. The historic capital city is no more,...

Eight New Catalogues Reviewed This Month

This month we review eight new bookseller catalogues. For those who like it cold, Bjarne Tokerud Bookseller offers a catalogue of the Arctic, Iceland, and Canadiana. Heading to a land not so far no...

Rare Book Monthly

  • Gonnelli
    Auction 51
    Antique prints, paintings and maps
    May 14st 2024
    Gonnelli: Leonard Bramer, The descent from the cross, 1634. Starting price 3200€
    Gonnelli: Gustav Hjalmar de Morner Karel, Rome’s Carnival, 1820. Starting price 1000€
    Gonnelli: Various Authors, Mater Dolorosa, 1700. Starting price 200€
    Gonnelli: Giovanni Battista Piranesi, Carcere Oscura, 1790. Starting price 180€
    Gonnelli: Jan Brueghel, Marine fauna view, 1620 ca. Starting price 28000€
    Gonnelli: Ippolito Scarsella, Mary and Christ with Sant Rocco and Arch-Angel Michele,1615. Starting price 8000€
    Gonnelli: Hans Sebald Beham, Adam and Eve, 1543. Starting price 600€
    Gonnelli: Francesco Burani, Baccanale, 1630. Starting Price 280€
    Gonnelli: Giuseppe Maria Mitelli, Plance from Ventiquattr’ore, 1675. Starting price 800€
    Gonnelli: Giuseppe Angeli, Livorno’s Plan, 1793. Starting price 240€
    Gonnelli: XIV Century Artist, Capital “N” letter, 1350 ca. Starting price 340€
  • Sotheby’s
    Modern First Editions
    Available for Immediate Purchase
    Sotheby’s, Available Now: Winston Churchill. The Second World War. Set of First-Edition Volumes. 6,000 USD
    Sotheby’s, Available Now: A.A. Milne, Ernest H. Shepard. A Collection of The Pooh Books. Set of First-Editions. 18,600 USD
    Sotheby’s, Available Now: Salvador Dalí, Lewis Carroll. Alice's Adventures in Wonderland. Finely Bound and Signed Limited Edition. 15,000 USD
    Sotheby’s
    Modern First Editions
    Available for Immediate Purchase
    Sotheby’s, Available Now: Ian Fleming. Live and Let Die. First Edition. 9,500 USD
    Sotheby’s, Available Now: J.K. Rowling. Harry Potter Series. Finely Bound First Printing Set of Complete Series. 5,650 USD
    Sotheby’s, Available Now: Ernest Hemingway. A Farewell to Arms. First Edition, First Printing. 4,200 USD
  • Bonhams, Apr. 28 – May 7: Isaac Newton on chemistry and matter, and alchemy, Autograph Manuscript, "A Key to Snyders," 3 pp, after 1674. $100,000 - $150,000
    Bonhams, Apr. 28 – May 7: Exceptionally rare first printing of Plato's Timaeus. Florence, 1484. $50,000 - $80,000
    Bonhams, Apr. 28 – May 7: On the Philosophy of Self-Interest: Adam Smith's copy of Helvetius's De l'homme, Paris, 1773. $40,000 - $60,000
    Bonhams, Apr. 28 – May 7: "Magical Calendar of Tycho Brahe" - very rare hermetic broadside. Engraved by Merian for De Bry. c.1618. $30,000 - $50,000
    Bonhams, Apr. 28 – May 7: Author's presentation issue of Einstein's proof of Relativity, "Erklärung der Perihelbewegung des Merkur aus der allgemeinen Relativitätstheorie." 1915. $30,000 - $50,000
    Bonhams, Apr. 28 – May 7: First Latin edition of Maimonides' Guide for the Perplexed. Paris, 1520. $20,000 - $30,000.
    Bonhams, Apr. 28 – May 7: De Broglie manuscript on the nature of matter in quantum physics, 3 pp, 1954. $20,000 - $30,000
    Bonhams, Apr. 28 – May 7: Tesla autograph letter signed on electricty and electromagnetic theory. 1894. $20,000 - $30,000
    Bonhams, Apr. 28 – May 7: Heinrich Hertz scientific manuscript on his mentor Hermann Von Helmholtz, 1891. $20,000 - $30,000
    Bonhams, Apr. 28 – May 7: The greatest illustrated work in Alchemy: Micheal Maier's Atalanta Fugiens. Oppenheim, 1618. $30,000 - $50,000
    Bonhams, Apr. 28 – May 7: Illustrated Alchemical manuscript, a Mysterium Magnum of the Rosicurcians, 18th-century. $30,000 - $50,000
    Bonhams, Apr. 28 – May 7: Rare Largest Paper Presentation Copy of Newton's Principia, London, 1726. The third and most influential edition. $60,000 - $90,000

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